Place an alighting board in front of each hive. Get a board about eighteen inches wide and two feet long. Nail on some cleats at each end, to prevent warping. Rest one edge of this board on the ground, the other edge on the end of the platform in front of the hive. By this arrangement many bees will be saved in early spring which would otherwise be lost. By the old plan of setting the hives two or three feet high, with no alighting board, and a free draught of wind beneath, the loss of bees was very great, especially in the early spring months, on chilly afternoons following a very warm forenoon. The bees, returning loaded with pollen, are unable to reach a hive placed so high, and are blown to the earth by the hundreds, and becoming chilled, die. The death of a few bees is a great loss in early spring, for they are required in keeping up the animal heat in the hive to forward breeding.
The location of bees as here recommended will be found greatly superior to any other, for other reasons than those mentioned, and which are too numerous to herein specify.
Every one who commences bee-keeping should ever remember, that bees always mark the location of their hives. The young bee the first time it leaves the hive invariably does this. The same is true with all swarms, in the first flight in early spring, after being dormant in the hive through the winter months.
In marking the location, the bee comes from the hive, and at the entrance, rises on the wing. Turning its head toward the hive, it recedes in circles, backward, at first describing a circle so small as to be scarcely perceptible, but enlarging as the distance from the hive is increased. They thus take into view all objects surrounding the hive, so that they are able to return to their own hives without difficulty. After one or two excursions begun in this manner, the bee leaves the hive in a direct line for the fields, without taking any further precaution whatever, and returns by its knowledge of the objects in the vicinity of the hives, without difficulty.
Notwithstanding there might be a hundred hives standing in a line, with only a few inches space between each, and all of the same color and appearance, if left to itself no bee would enter the hive of its neighbor, although there might be hundreds of thousands of the busy workers from all the hives, flying promiscuously about in the air. Each bee knows its own hive perfectly, and if from any accident it enters its neighbor's house, immediate death is usually the result; or possibly it may escape, after being roughly handled, and made to understand that it is trespassing, on forbidden ground.
Some bee keepers, with little knowledge of their occupation, often remove a hive of bees several rods, in the working season. The result is, all the bees that had marked the location (and all the old bees had done this) are lost. They would continue to leave the hive in a direct line, after its removal, not taking the precaution to mark the location, as they were unaware of the change, and when they were ready to return they would return to the former place.
Bees may be safely moved a dozen miles or more, at any time, as this takes them beyond their knowledge of country; but in such cases set the hives six feet apart at least. If this precaution is not taken and the hives are set close together, the bees will rush from the hives on being let out, not knowing the location has been changed, and when they return, many will enter the wrong hive, and be slaughtered without mercy.
Therefore let stocks be placed, early in the spring before they have marked the situation of the stands they are to occupy for the summer, and not change them after the bees have commenced their labors—at least change them no less distance than twelve miles.
